Not Today
by WinchesterFanchild
Summary: Limp!Sam Injured!Sam Angry!Dean - The boys are at each other's throats again, and Dean is getting on Sam's last nerve. Then they get a call that they are needed on a job, which leads to Sam getting hurt. Can Sam overcome his pride, and ask for help before it's too late? And will Dean be able to get off his high horse in time to avoid possibly losing his brother for good this time?
1. Chapter 1

_**AN: Probably will be two chapters to this. Think of it as an extended one-shot. Second part to be up within a week since my finals at university will be over by Monday.**_

_Sam_

"You're getting seriously on my last nerve now, man," Sam rolled onto his side and sat up wearily. The motel room was dimly lit but he could just about make out the silhouette of his obnoxious brother lumbering towards the bed next to his, and the door crashing into the wall had been impossible to ignore. Dean was back, and he was drunk. As if Dean hadn't been annoying enough recently.

"Shhhhhhh…" Dean tried to whisper, and Sam felt the bed shake under him as Dean walked into it and nearly fell flat on his face. "Don't wake Sam."

"Come on, Dean!" Sam stood up with a sigh, and grabbed his wayward older brother by the shoulders. Guiding him to his own bed for the night, Sam shoved until Dean's knees buckled and then lifted his feet, complete with hunting boots, onto the bed with the rest of him. "Shut up and go to bed. I'm trying to sleep."

"But I was having f… having fun," Dean protested, as Sam climbed back into bed and rolled over so he faced the wall, his back to his brother. "Can't rem… I can't 'member the last time you were fun, Sammy."

"God! Dean, are we really going to start this again? You can barely stand, I'm tired and it's 2am. Go to sleep!" He shut his eyes and did his best to ignore Dean's mumbling, and his many and varied insults to his masculinity, until his brother finally succumbed to sleep, leaving the room blissful quiet once more. Of course Dean's soft snores made silence a pipe dream, but Sam could deal with that as long as he wasn't talking.

They had been at each other's throats for days, and Dean's little stunt had been the latest in a long line of things that were driving Sam insane. Sleeping in until lunchtime one day so that they missed the meeting that Sam had spent hours organising with the sheriff involved in the job they were working, and then getting Sam up before 5am the next, insisting that they just had to get on the road before daybreak. He had even made Sam wait another hour to use a service station when he needed to relieve himself, and choosing expensive motels when they both knew that they hadn't got the money.

Sam knew that they were petty things, really, and that none of it mattered in the long run, but Dean knew exactly how to push his buttons and enjoyed doing it. Sam had so far resisted the urge to strangle or shoot his brother, but he was hyper aware that unless he did something soon he was liable to explode.

He lay there, staring at the blackness in the corner of the room until the sunlight started to stream through the curtains, unable to get back to sleep after Dean's interruption to his dreams. When he couldn't bear to lie there any longer, he got up and showered to make him look a little less like he hadn't slept. After all, the monsters didn't gank themselves, and they hadn't had a day off in weeks. Evil didn't rest these days and, now that Sam hadn't either, he needed to be ready when the call came in from Bobby or Ellen. Or perhaps both, if they were having a particularly lucky day.

Sam retrieved his laptop from the floor beside his bed, relieved that Dean had missed it during his rampage. That would've meant war. He made a mental note not to leave it anywhere Dean could get at it in the future. The mood Dean was in at the moment, there was no telling which of Sam's possessions was a potential target.

Two hours later, after he'd finished sifting through the never ending piles of bullshit conspiracy sites and creepy-ass chat rooms in search of genuine supernatural sightings, Dean finally began to stir and Sam pushed the computer to one side. Dean rolled over onto his stomach, legs tangled up in the sheet, and stretched so far that one outstretched hand actually touched the wall near the bed. Then he rolled off the bed and to his feet in one motion, staggering into the bathroom without acknowledging Sam at all.

Sam raised an eyebrow as the door slammed shut behind him, and then smirked with smug satisfaction as, seconds later, he heard Dean's whimper of pain from the sharp sound hitting the delicate bubble of hangover surrounding him. Let him suffer for a bit. It was his own fault for getting that drunk anyway.

"Sam," Dean called from the bathroom, but Sam chose to ignore him. Dean would take any opportunity to drag him into an argument and he really was too tired to fight with his hothead of a brother this morning. Sam checked his watch and corrected himself. He was too tired to fight this afternoon.

"Sam!" Dean growled, pulling the door open and stomping out in just his towel. He obviously hadn't showered yet, but he looked pissed. He looked like totally crap if Sam was honest. He probably should have made Dean at least brush his teeth last night, but he'd be damned if he'd admit that to a furious and hung-over Dean Winchester.

"What?" he asked, as calmly as he could manage and with poker face in full effect.

"You know damn well what, Sam," Dean fumed, holding his towel around his waist with on hand, whilst gesturing wildly with the other towards Sam. "I look like complete shit, that's what. Why did you let me go out like this?"

"Wait, what?" he blurted, incredulously. That was the last thing he'd been expecting. "I have no idea what you are even talking about, Dean."

"I'm talking about last night. You know, that time between yesterday afternoon and now. I went out… can't remember where, and I looked like a homeless person. No wonder I didn't pull. You could have told me how crappy I looked before I left. I mean look at my hair."

"Wow. Dean, are you actually that vain." Sam's flood gate crumbled, and he let rip. "Your mood these past few days has probably got more to do with your inability to pull than your hair. Your hair looked fine last night when you left. You got home and passed out on your face at some ungodly hour last night, man, and you probably drooled on yourself at some point. It's not my fault, and it's definitely not my problem. I'm fed up with dealing with your drunken ass all the time, Dean."

"Wha…" Dean's mouth dropped open as Sam's tirade came to an abrupt end. Sam knew that he'd already said too much but he couldn't take it back now. The cat had ripped the bag to shreds, and the shit was already dripping from the figurative ceiling fan.

"You heard me, Dean," Sam stammered, and then cleared his throat uncomfortably. "Go shower before that smell becomes permanent." Dean didn't laugh and the weak attempt at humour, but he did shut himself in the bathroom again. Sam heard a few moments of inactivity, with only his own heavy breathing to punctuate the silence, and then the shower puttered into life slowly. Sam took the opportunity to let his mental walls down, and rubbed his palms across his cheeks, as if he could somehow massage the words he had spoken in anger back into his mouth.

A soft beeping cut through the air, and Sam jumped in surprise. His phone was gently vibrating on the dresser beside his bed, and Sam knew he had let his guard down for too long. That would be Bobby with a job, and he needed to be calm and professional. People's lives depended on them, and they could deal with their insatiable sibling rivalry crap later.

"Bobby?" Sam asked into the phone, not even pausing to check the caller ID before answering. There weren't many people who had his number, and only a few ever had reason to call.

"Try again, amigo," a familiar voice replied and Sam smiled in spite of himself.

"Ash!" They hadn't seen Ash in a while, having been absent from the Roadhouse for at least two months, and it was good to hear from him. "How's things? Ellen? Jo?" Sam added the last name automatically, thinking that Dean would want to know how his biggest groupie was doing, and then remembered that it wasn't likely that he would actually pass on the information at the moment.

"We're all good, my man. Thanks for asking', but that's not why I called."

"How can we help?"

"Well, I just got a call from a Roadhouse regular who works in the area. The area where y'all are, I mean. Don't think you've ever met, but he called and asked for a favour."

"So, you called me?" Sam asked, although the answer was fairly self-evident.

"Exactly. At face value it's your run-of-the-mill haunting, but this one's got a bit of a temper. Alastair got on the wrong side of it this morning, and he wanted a hand. If you're up for it?" Ash added, as an afterthought, but there was no need. The Winchester's were known in the wider community as some of the most dependable hunters in the business. Family feuds aside, they knew the value of a good deed better than just about anyone.

"No worries, we'll go as soon as we can be packed up." Sam heard the bathroom door open once more, and turned to Dean to make sure he knew that he was on the phone. He pointed at the pile of dirty clothes Dean had just dumped on his bed, and signal that they needed to pack up and leave. Dean scowled at Sam and sighed, but grabbed his duffel and thankfully did as instructed. Even hung over, Dean wasn't stupid. If a call came in, they laid everything aside and did the job to the best of their abilities.

"Thanks Sam," Ash told him again, after he'd finished giving him the location of the haunting and all the additional information he had on the ghost in question. It wasn't much, but it was enough that Sam thought that they could be in and out by the end of the afternoon, if all went well.

"Sure thing, Ash. Stay safe now." He hung up and turned to grab his now full duffel bag from Dean, who was impatiently holding it out to him, car keys in hand. Sam had to hand it to him, pissed off or not. Angry Dean was definitely efficient.

They made polite conversation in the car, Sam only speaking as necessary to communicate the information Dean needed, and Dean responding in no more than two syllables. They put together a plan as best they could whilst using as few words as possible. It wasn't the most comprehensive of schematics, but the idea was simple. Dean was centre point as usually for ghosts, and Sam would cover him. It was the tactic they always used, and discussion wasn't strictly necessary. Sam knew that they could run that drill with their eye closed, since their father had made them practise it blindfolded more times that he could remember. In. Out. Done.

"This is it," Dean said, and shut off the engine. Sam hadn't noticed their arrival, but now he was alert and ready to go. He could feel his muscles were tenser than usual; a symptom of lack of sleep, but it was nothing he couldn't handle. He'd had worse.

"Okay," was the only reply he needed to give, and they climbed out of their respective car seats in silence. The house they had drawn up to was small, secluded; a cottage really, and didn't look very haunted to Sam. That wasn't any indication of a haunting though, and he could feel the goose bumps rise on his arms and the back of his neck as he stared at the yellowing brick around the door. The ghost must be pretty powerful to elicit that reaction, he knew, but that wasn't a problem. A good challenge was exactly what they needed to vent some pent up aggression.

Dean handed Sam his usual salt-round shotgun, and hooked his rifle over his shoulder casually. Dean seemed chilled, but Sam could see him shooting daggers at him when he thought Sam wasn't looking. They would have to talk, soon, but not right now. Now they killed this son-of-a-bitch.

"Come and get me, bitch," Dean called obnoxiously as he stepped over the threshold and into the hallway of the small house. The pale pink paint on the walls was crackled and peeling in places, a sure sign of neglect and disuse. Sam wasn't surprised. The aura of the spectral squatter was actually palpable inside, and he couldn't imagine that even the most stoic sceptic would actually want to live here for long.

"I'll scope upstairs. Stay here," Dean told him, already half way up the stairs. Wait, that wasn't the plan.

"Wait, Dean. We need to stay together." Sam called out to him but Dean was already gone, hidden as the stairs curved around to the right. "I have a bad feeling about this," he said quietly, to himself. He turned to shut the front door to hide their actions from anyone who might walk by, but it slammed by itself before he could reach out a hand. A blast of ice cold air ruffled his hand, and he froze.

"Shit," he whispered, turning to find himself face to face with a middle aged woman with bloodlust swimming in her cold, dead eyes. "Dean!"

"Eat your vegetables, you little wretch," the ghost hissed, speaking to an invisible daughter that she had murdered several years back. Ash had said that she had slit the girl's throat with a kitchen knife, undoubtedly the one she was clutching to her greying chest even now, because she had refused to eat her dinner. The woman had gone insane with the realisation of what she had done, and then offed herself, before returning from the beyond with a burning desire to kill anyone else who got in her way.

"No thanks," Sam told her calmly, trying to take a few subtle steps away, towards where he hoped Dean would be, but a pale hand grabbed for his arm and he felt her grip him hard. Ghosts weren't supposed to be able to touch him. He froze in shock, and realised a beat too late that she wasn't going to allow him the time to recover from the revelation that she was somehow corporeal.

"You will eat your food," she screamed and pulled him towards her, thrusting her other arm forward as he fell into her. He felt the breath leave his body as something scratched his skin, and then he was on the floor as she passed through him like she was a normal ghost. She was controlling her form, he realised, which made her the strongest ghost they had ever encountered.

"Hey," Dean roared, charging into the room and shooting the woman square in the face with a salt round. "Got you, bitch. Not so tough now."

"Dean, she can touch you," Sam gasped, his breath coming slow. An uncomfortable sluggishness was settling over him, and he didn't like it. "We need to burn the house. She's too strong and there's no time."

"Let's go then, Sam. Get up," Dean told him, and Sam nodded. He was glad that Dean wasn't trying to help him up, especially not today, but he still struggled to get to his feet as Dean ran out to the car to get lighter fluid. Burning the whole house was going to take more than they had between them.

"Ouch," Sam winced, supporting his weight on a table as he pulled himself up to stand straight. He lifted a shaky hand to wipe his face and was stunned to see it covered in blood. He hadn't hit anything as he fell, or nothing he could remember. He didn't know why he would be bleeding.

A cursory glance down answered his question, and he cursed his luck. The handle of a knife, the kitchen knife the ghost had been holding if he wasn't mistaken, was embedded in his side. That was going to be painful, he could tell. The blade hadn't looked that long from what he had seen during their brief encounter, and it had missed all major organs or arteries, but it would still have to be removed and that would hurt.

He gingerly took hold of the plastic and eased it out gently, gasping as the pain washed over him. He felt distinctly nauseous as he saw the length that extracted itself from his abdomen, but he knew that it could be worse. It would certainly not be the worst cut he'd had or the deepest, but it hurt like hell and back.

"Come on, Sam," he heard Dean scream at him from outside, and his head snapped up to look in the direction of the front door. The crimson stained knife in his hand clattered to the ground, bounced once, and then was still. Sam took a deep breath, pressed a hand against his injury, and hurried outside to join his impatient brother.

"Sorry, man," he mumbled, as Dean finished dousing the house with fuel and tossed a can of it in past Sam as he exited. He watched as Dean tossed a lighter on it, and the fuel caught. Then they were back in the car, speeding away before the whole thing ignited.

"I'm sorry I left you, Sam," Dean said quickly, clearly not keen to apologise but acknowledging that he was at fault. "You okay?" There it was. Try as he may, Dean couldn't quite conceal the concern from Sam, but it was a little bit late now that they were in the car. Sam felt his wound throb and the blood seep into his shirt, and pulled his jacket over it to hide it from Dean's prying eyes. He could have used that concern inside the house, when he was getting the knife out, but Dean hadn't been interested then. Now he was fine; had handled it and he could deal with a little bit of blood by himself. He didn't need any help from his brother. Not today.

"Nothing I can't handle," he told Dean firmly, and Dean nodded before turning his attention back to the road ahead. Not today.

_**AN: I'm going to be writing a lot over Christmas as I'm home from university. Any requests are considered and most welcome. Favourite, review, and follow if you enjoyed. Thanks.**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**Okay, so I lied. I fully intended to write this chapter months ago, but life got in the way. Sorry, but my family comes first. There will also be a third chapter to this soon. If you're returning to this after a while I would recommend refreshing your memory of the first chapter. Enjoy.**_

"I need food," Dean announced into the uncomfortable silence in the car. Sam hadn't said a single word since they had left the house burning in the dust over an hour ago. He was curled up against the passenger-side door, and had been since they had started driving, and looked like he might have fallen asleep.

"Whatever, man. You're driving," Sam mumbled, turning to meet his gaze. Okay, so not asleep. He did look tired to Dean though, so he wasn't surprised that Sam hadn't argued. He also looked uncomfortable, but didn't keep eye contact long enough for Dean to be sure. He'd have to keep an eye on his brother for a while to make sure he was in one piece.

Dean couldn't believe that he'd been so stupid as to leave Sammy downstairs alone back there. He'd tried to apologise when they had climbed back into the Impala, but it hadn't come out the way he had intended it to. He knew that Sam was upset with him, and that he'd been a complete ass-wipe these last few weeks, but he hoped that they could talk and he could apologise properly. So, they were stopping for a burger and a hopefully for spot of brother bonding, as awkward as that would undoubtedly be.

Dean found an empty parking spot right beside the door to the diner, and they both climbed out. Dean made sure to watch Sam carefully for signs of injury, but either he was alright or Sam had gotten better at hiding things from him. He sincerely hoped it wasn't the latter because, let's face it, they already had more secrets than was healthy between the two of them.

"What're you gonna get then Sammy?" Dean asked, smiling as he walked around the car to join his little brother at the door to the joint. He just had to hope that Sam would let him take this first step toward mending the burnt bridge between them. "As for me, I think I fancy a nice greasy burger just for once." He slapped a hand across Sam's shoulders, and then hurried inside to fill up on protein.

Sam watched him go for a second, a smile spreading across his face at the small peace offering from Dean, and then started to follow him. He lifted a hand to push open the glass door, momentarily ignoring his twinging abdomen, but a searing pain shot up his side and he yanked his hand down to cover his wound before he could even process the pain. As soon as it had flared up, the pain was gone again. The dull throbbing remained, but it appeared that moving that particular limb was not a good idea.

He pushed open the door with his other hand to see that his brother had already found a table, and was chatting excitedly to a waitress. The waitress glanced at him over Dean's shoulder, concern obvious in her eyes. She must have seen his face grimace in pain, but thankfully Dean didn't seem to have seen anything. Sam guessed that Dean's mind was almost completely focussed on meat, so he was surprised when abruptly Dean turned back and waved him over. Dean was addicted to burgers, and that never failed to make Sam smile.

"I'll be over in a minute," Sam called to him, quickly picking up a newspaper from the stand beside the door and feigning interest. He didn't want to come any closer, where Dean might notice the blood. He hadn't checked yet what his shirt looked like, and his jacket was still tucked tightly over the top, but he knew that it would become visible sooner or later. Jacket or not, blood was hard to hide. He needed to clean up before they ate. He put the newspaper down, and signalled to a door to his right. "I'm gonna use the restroom. Order for me." Then he was gone, as fast as he could manage to move to get away from Dean's prying gaze.

Dean looked suspicious that Sam was letting him order, as every time he did Sam would bitch about his choice, but he wasn't likely to start an argument at this particular moment. He turned back just to be sure, as he reached the panel wood door and pushed it open with his good hand, but Dean had gone back to went back to his conversation with the waitress. Sam slipped into the restroom and let the door swing shut with a dull thud.

Sam sighed in relief when he saw that there were several, spacious individual cubicles in the restroom, and quickly locked himself in one. The last thing he needed was someone to walk in on him. The rest of the room was deserted, which was a small miracle in itself, but he also knew that he would need to work quickly so as to not arouse suspicions with Dean. Sam was convinced that Dean already knew something was up, but he hoped that he would have enough time to wash up before Dean came looking.

Taking care not to contort his body to much, Sam eased his heavy jacket off, hanging it on a conveniently positioned hook on the stall door. Leaning back against one of the walls, Sam finally looked down at himself. It certainly didn't look pretty. His shirt had originally had a blue-white checked pattern on it that was no longer visible in a large patch above the source of the blood-flow. The blood looked thick and sticky, which wasn't a problem in itself, but he was slightly concerned to see that it hadn't begun to dry at all. That meant that fresh blood must be still oozing from the wound, and that was his first priority. Stem the flow and the scar could start to form, as the natural healing abilities of the body took over.

Wincing as the cotton started to come free of his skin, Sam peeled off his shirt as slowly as he could bare, revealing a mottled blue-purple bruise coated in yet more blood underneath. The epicentre of the carnage was a small puncture wound, almost clinically neat in shape, which was pouring with Sam's most valuable commodity.

"Damn," Sam whispered, seeing the rate of blood loss. "This isn't normal." He didn't understand what was happening to him. He had seen the size and length of the blade. He'd been pierced with worse when he was fifteen, and the scarring had started within an hour. It had been more than two since he had pulled the knife out. He could see the size and shape of it now and there was nothing to suggest any lasting damage had been caused; nothing to explain how he was suddenly starting to feel weaker, and his legs began to buckle beneath him.

Sam slid limply down the wall, chest heaving and heart pounding like a drum, until he was sprawled beside the toilet bowl staring at the grey tiling beneath his body. He couldn't move and, whilst he knew he should, he didn't really want to. After all, what was the point. He was going to die, and Dean was eating a burger right now, because Sam had wanted to be the big man for once. He groaned as he felt a pulse of something bitter and wrong flooding through his body, and then he succumbed to the sudden exhaustion without another word.

The bruises around the wound started to ripple and roil as if they were storm clouds, or living creatures on his skin, as they began to spread across his skin in tiny blue-black tendrils, heading straight for his fading heartbeat.

Dean watched as the pretty blonde waitress lifted his burger, and Sam's salad, from the hatch next to the bar, and wound her way around the other patrons to reach him. She placed them both on the table in front of him and smiled as he pulled his eagerly towards him. He didn't wait for her to leave before he picked up the greasy food, but when he saw that she was still there he paused, burger inches from his open mouth.

"Everything alright?" he asked, lowering the burger reticently, turning to see that she hadn't made a move to leave.

"It's not my place, but the man you were talking to; is he your friend?" She gestured to Sam's salad to indicate who she meant, and Dean nodded.

"My brother," he agreed. "Did you want me to give him your number when he comes back?" He wouldn't be surprised, but was a little disappointed if he was honest. She was cute, but if she was into Sam he guessed that was okay by him, even if he was attracted to her himself. They both attracted similar kinds of girls so it wasn't the first time the same thing had happened to him or Sam, and it wouldn't be the last.

"Well, yes," she began, but shook her head as if annoyed at his words. "That's not why I mentioned it though. When he came in he looked like he was in pain. Is he alright?"

Dean felt the blood drain from his face at her words, and he grabbed the woman's forearm instinctively. She squeaked but made no move to extract her arm. That had been the react she was expecting, but not the one she was hoping for.

"What did you see?" he hissed through clenched teeth, so she told him everything. He was on his feet before she could finish, striding towards the men's restroom like a man on a mission. He forgot that he was still holding onto her arm, but she hurried to keep up of her own volition. He was clearly concerned for his brother, as she would be if that had been her own baby brother, so she wanted to do what she could to help.

Dean shoved open the door, and rushed in. He was a little confused when he didn't see anyone inside, but then he noticed that one of the stalls had the door shut. He could hear no movement from inside, and for a man of Sam's size that was a statistical impossibility.

"Sam," he called, pushing against the door gently at first, then with more force when it held against the pressure. He shoved with all his might and felt the lock give just a little, but it still resisted his efforts. "Sammy, can you hear me?"

There was no response, so he turned back to the scared looking waitress, who held the door open and was watching anxiously from outside.

"Call an ambulance," he shouted to her, more angrily than he meant to but he regretted nothing. If it made her hurry then that was an acceptable outcome to Dean. He and Sam hated ambulances, but he didn't think that they had a choice in this case. Sam was unresponsive and he couldn't get to him.

He continued to pound on the door, but it wasn't going to budge. He could hear the girl shouting for someone to call 911 outside, and he hoped that whatever town the paramedics came from wasn't too far away. He remembered seeing a 20 kilometre road sign to somewhere a few miles back, but didn't know where exactly this diner was in relation to that town.

"Fuck!" he screamed, to nothing in particular, and kicked the stall door as hard as his steel-capped boots would allow. He heard something crack, and quickly pushed at the door again. His toes hurt now, but the door easily split down the middle when he pushed against it with one hand.

He forced his way in and found Sam motionless, slumped again one wall. He was too tall to stretch out his leg as he lay against the wooden panel, so his knees were bent at the awkward angle that they had been when he lost consciously. He began to lift his brother and pull him free of the cubicle, but he was too heavy. He unlocked the broken half of the door still held up by the iron bolt, and threw it aside. This gave him enough space to drag Sam out into the bathroom and lie him down on the slightly damp tiles.

"Sam?" Dean asked, not really expecting a response. "Oh God, come on Sammy." He checked Sam's pulse and for a single heart-stopping moment he found nothing, but then he found a faint beat at his throat.

Satisfied that his brother was alive and still breathing, Dean moved down his body to attend to the glaringly obvious wound that his brother had clearly been trying to clean when he had passed out. Sam's shirt was hanging open, and one half was slick with crimson blood, sticking it to his skin and Dean's hands as he pushed it aside. What he saw underneath made him gasp in horror.

The skin around the small puncture wound was black, blacker than almost anything on earth. At first glance it could almost look like mere bruising but more a moment would show that the blackness was absolute, and was writhing and swirling under the skin. There were only two things under heaven that Dean knew of that were that precise shade of obsidian; demon smoke and black magic.

Dean was pretty sure that Sam wasn't covered in demon smoke, which left no further options. Sam had come into contact with some serious black magic at that house and Dean had no idea what to do about it. He tried to think calmly, to figure out what could have happened, and what to do, but all he could focus on was the blood on his hands.

"What do I do?" he shouted at the ceiling, but he didn't expect an answer. He and Castiel weren't really on speaking terms at the moment, but he had no other choice. Maybe begging would help. "Cas, if you can hear me I need your help. Sam needs you. Please?" He stared heavenward for several pregnant moments, but the trench-coated angel didn't appear. Dean was alone.

"They're in here," he heard a voice outside the door, and then he was surrounded by green-clad paramedics who swarmed the room. They started asking him questions, and he felt himself answering. He gave them one of their hundreds of aliases, he didn't even know which one, but he wasn't really concentrating on them. His eyes didn't move from Sam, not even for a moment.

"We need you to move now, sir." A woman's voice, and a gentle hand on his arm, but he ignored her. "Sir?" He felt someone pulling him away, lifting him to his feet, but he didn't look around. He couldn't look away from Sam, who hadn't moved a single muscle since Dean had found him.

He looked so still; so peaceful. Dean could almost imagine that Sam was sleeping, if it weren't for the black magic burrowing its way through his brother towards his heart, and his soul. He was watching a dark force stealing his baby brother away from him and there was nothing he could do about it.

"We'll take him from here, Mr Walker," the woman said again, and Dean nodded mechanically. He forgot her words as soon as he heard them and made to move back towards Sam. Something was holding him back as he tried to move, and he began to struggle against it. It only held him tighter, and he finally looked down angrily to see that he was being held back by three people. One was the nice blonde waitress, who had tears streaking her face. Her gaze locked with his and she shook her head slowly once, twice. Dean blinked and stopped struggling, utterly defeated.

The waitress led his gentle from the restroom, allowing the paramedics enough room to put Sam on a stretcher and carry him out into the restaurant. Dean wanted to follow him but knew that he'd have to drive his car. He looked down to see that the woman beside him was talking.

"…calm down. He's going to be fine," she was saying, but her face was pale and drawn. She placed a hand on his shoulder and forced him to pay attention. "He's going to be fine, ya hear me. Now go get in your car and follow them before they pull out of the lot." Dean finally managed to concentrate long enough to make sense of what she said to him.

"What about the food?" he asked, starting to pull out his wallet. She waved him away.

"I talked to Danny. He owns this joint. He said not to worry about it." She handed him a takeaway box he hadn't even noticed her holding, and smiled at him. "Just go and be there for your brother. I would do the same if it was my brother."

"Thank you," he said earnestly, taking the box and hurrying outside without a backwards glance. He threw it in the backseat without a second thought and climbed into the driver's seat just in time to catch up to the ambulance that was pulling out onto the highway, lights flashing. He stayed as close behind as he could, pulling out his phone and dialling a familiar number.

"Bobby?" he asked, as soon as the other end was picked up. The older man grunted his agreement, but Dean hurried on before he could answer. "I don't know who else to call. I'm just outside…" he paused to look at a road sign that was just passing by. "I'm headed for the infirmary in Muncie, Indiana, and Sam's hurt bad Bobby. Some kind of black magic, and I don't know how to help him."

Dean was half expecting to hear Bobby make an excuse, like Castiel had by ignoring him, but he had no such reaction from his friend and mentor.

"I'll be there in less than 12 hours," Bobby told Dean, calmly, and Dean could hear him already in motion in the background of the call. "Stay calm and with Sam until then, okay?"

"I will, Bobby. Hurry!"

_**Final chapter coming as soon as possible. Thanks for reading, and don't forget to review and favourite if you would be so kind.**_


	3. Chapter 3

_**Last chapter, and there isn't a five month gap this time. Aren't I so good at this? Anyway, just so you know, this is the closest I've ever come to actually killing same. I don't like death fics, to read or to write, but this time I was so tempted! Enjoy.**_

"Don't you dare tell me that I can't see my own son!" Dean's head snapped up at the sound of the familiar, gruff voice outside the door. He leaped up from his low chair beside the hospital bed, knees protesting after being motionless for so long, and was across the room before he realised that he had moved. He could see only shadows through the plexi-glass window on the door, so he pulled it open to see if it really was him.

"Bobby," he exclaimed, relief flooding through him when he caught sight of the man he'd been waiting for. He'd sat and waited for eleven agonising hours, and he'd started to think that Bobby wasn't coming. He had nothing but faith in the man, who had been a father-figure to both him and Sam for years, but he'd started to lose hope as the hours dragged on and Sam just got worse.

"Dean," Bobby said angrily, and hurried over to pull Dean into a tight hug. Dean wasn't expected that reaction, but didn't try to stop him. If he was being honest, he really needed the reassurance right at that moment. Bobby turned his head towards Dean and whispered into his ear. "She wouldn't let me through. I told the nurse I was your father; it was the only way that I could get past the front desk. Just go with it," he told Dean, and Dean smiled in spite of himself.

"It's okay, ma'am." Dean broke away from Bobby and turned to the nurse who had been arguing with him. "He came because I called him. I'll take him to see my brother." She looked more than a little annoyed at the disturbance that Bobby had caused in the hall, but she didn't argue. She just nodded and hurried off down the hall and around a corner. Dean guessed that she was going to care for some other patients, which was good news for them. They were not going to want to be disturbed if Bobby was going to be brewing up pig's blood in Sam's room, or something else equally unsuitable for public view.

"Come on, son." Bobby pushed open the door that Dean had just come out of, and Dean followed him inside. "Let's see what we can do for you," he told Sam, taking Dean's vacated seat and putting down the bag he had carried in with him. "What the hell is that?"

He caught sight of the inky-black wrongness that now covered more of Sam's abdomen, and that was still creeping slowly up his chest, and he gasped involuntarily. Dean didn't know how fast the thing was moving, but he knew that it wouldn't be long before it reached his chest, and then his heart. He didn't know what would happen when it did, but from their previous encounters with black magic he didn't want to find out.

"Have you seen anything like this before?" Dean asked anxiously, realising as he asked that he hadn't given Bobby enough time to actually think. "Sorry," he added, as an afterthought.

"It's alright, lad," Bobby replied, giving Dean a rare smile. "As a matter of fact I have."

"What is it then?" It gave Dean a modicum of hope that Bobby seemed to know what was going on, because Dean hated that he had to admit that he didn't have a clue.

"A hunter I knew a few years back, Ronan. He went after a coven of witches in Old Salem, all clichés and no real power, but they did have a knife that some proper witch had done some bad mojo on."

Dean interrupted the story, he just couldn't help it. "I didn't think that they could give power to an inanimate object."

"Neither did we," Bobby agreed. "Nevertheless, we wandered in and Ronan got cut bad. I got him out but it was too late. The blackness spread from the wound before we could stop it, and we couldn't find a way to slow the spread. It reached his heart, and…" Bobby stopped, as if realising he'd shared a little bit too much of his memories with the young man listening intently.

"Do you mean?" Dean could barely finish his sentence. "Does that mean that there is nothing we can do?" He could feel the panic rising in his chest and turned away from Bobby so that the older man wouldn't be able to see the fear in his eyes. He couldn't help but look back to Sam again, like he had done every five seconds since they had arrived at the hospital.

Sam was almost completely motionless, save for a single wracking tremor every time the blackness made a move. His skin was pale and coated in a thin sheen of sweat. He was cold to the touch, and Dean thought that he was getting colder. His eyes were moving under the thin eyelids, faster than Dean would have thought possible, but the doctor hadn't been able to wake him up. She had told him that it wasn't a coma, or even a deep sleep. She had said that it was just like he had closed his eyes for a normal REM cycle and just had failed to wake up. They couldn't explain it, but then they could never know the truth.

The truth was that Dean was losing Sam, losing his silly, smart, unique little brother, and there was nothing he could do about it. He had always thought that they would go down fighting, hunting some God or a feral Sasquatch together, but never like this. Not lying in a hospital bed with no hope. Not after how he had been acting towards Sam these last few days. Dean couldn't even remember the last thing they had said to each other, he couldn't even remember whether it had been hateful, and now it might be the last conversation they ever had. And then he would be alone.

"Dean," Bobby called, his familiar voice cutting though the morbid thoughts crowding into his mind. "Snap out of it."

"But you said," Dean protested, not even bothering to hide the desperation in his voice. He hated being helpless, unable to just shoot something and make everything better like he usually did.

"I said no such thing. Yes Ronan died, but not for nothing."

"But," Dean stammered.

"Shut up, you idjit," Bobby snapped. "Just listen. We took him to a doctor after, a doctor who knows about all this stuff. He found something, a fragment under the skin. The darkness was gone, but there was a shard of the knife that cut him left behind. What happened to Sam before he ended up like this?"

"We," Dean started, but then he realised that he didn't know. They had gone into that house, and then Dean had left him alone. Dean had been angry and stupid and had left his brother on his own, with a super-charged ghost with a penchant for violence. How could he have been so stupid? "I don't know. I didn't see, Bobby. We were hunting a psychotic ghost, but I don't see how he could have got hurt. Ghosts can't use weapons, can they?"

"Not normal ones, no, but if it had enough magic attached to it anything is possible."

"Sammy," Dean whispered, finally realising the gravity of his childish feud. Sam was dying and it was entirely down to Dean being a petty, whiny son-of-a-bitch. "I'm sorry!"

"Be sorry later," Bobby told him, in a tone that made it clear than he would take no nonsense from Dean. "For now you need to help me. I need to get supplies and I need you to be coherent enough to watch the door till I get back. Don't let anyone touch Sam, or they might make things worse."

"Worse? How could things be worse?" Dean asked in disbelief. "Sam's gonna die, and it's my f…"

"Shut up, and watch the door, Dean." Bobby rarely ever used his name, so Dean instinctively looked up to see Bobby glaring at him, holding the door open and already on his way out again. "I don't care whose fault it is. I'm not going to let him die, you hear me? Sam is not going anywhere on my watch!"

Then he was gone, and Dean was alone.

No, not alone. Dean was with Sammy, and there was nowhere else he would choose to be. He had left Sam behind in that house earlier, but not now. Dean locked the door to the room, the thin latch sliding across easily, and then slumped back into the seat. He just had to wait until Bobby got back. How hard could it be? He just had to hope that it wouldn't be too late. He looked up just in time to see Sam twitch just once, and the blackness pulse again, before it crawled ever closer to his heart.

"Hurry, Bobby!"

"Let me in, boy." Dean jumped, and nearly fell out of the chair. It had been a while since Bobby had gone, and Dean must have fallen asleep whilst he waited. He hadn't realised how tired he was, but it had to have been more than a day since he had slept. He was so tired, but he had needed to stay awake for Sam.

Sam! Dean jumped out of his chair and was over to the bedside in a heartbeat. He had let himself fall asleep while Sammy needed him most. He looked his brother over and let out a breath he hadn't realised he was keeping inside. Sam's chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm, unchanged from before he had fallen asleep. The black parasite was more widespread now, but Sam was still hanging on.

"Oi! What you waiting for?" Dean hurried over and unlocked the door, mumbling his apologies as Bobby barged through the door cursing. "What has gotten into you today?"

"Sorry," Dean repeated himself, staring down at the ground. Sometimes Bobby hit a little too close to home with the father act, it would have made his father proud to see the way Bobby had looked out for them. If only he wasn't quite so good at it sometimes, the way he put Dean in his place was absolutely uncanny.

"Never mind," Bobby brushed his apology aside, all forgiven. "Let's help Sam, shall we?" Bobby reached into his jacket and pulled out a cold, very clean-looking surgeon's scalpel sealed in plastic. "I didn't have the right tools to do what I need to do. Brought all the spell books I could find, but I didn't expect to be rummaging around inside your brother when I woke up this morning. Or should I say yesterday morning?"

"Rummaging? Are you sure you know what you're doing?" Dean asked, as Bobby pulled out a pair of latex gloves from the recesses of his huge jacket and put them on. Dean wondered how many other hospital supplies Bobby had under there to add to his stash at home later.

"Not really, but there is no other option," Bobby admitted, setting to work clearing the space around Sam's bed to give him room to work. "Now then, let's see what we've got here."

It seemed to Dean that Bobby had been at it for hours. He had blood, Sam's blood, on his hands and he was searching for something inside the epicentre of the black magic corrupting Sam's paling skin. They didn't even know if there was anything to find, and Bobby was working on a hunch. Bobby's hunches were better than other people's researched facts any day, but it was still a hunch. The blackness was getting closer and closer to its goal, increasing in speed now as if it could sense the threat of exposure, and Dean could only watch as Sammy's death grew ever closer.

"I think I've found it," Bobby hissed, his face twisted in concentration and his focus on the small speck of silver flashing underneath his fingers. "One moment… there!" he exclaimed, and pulled a dull grey lump of what looked like metal out between the pincers of a pair of tweezers.

"What is it?" Dean asked, walking towards him to get a better view of the object. It was the very tip, jagged and nasty-looking, of some kind of knife. It was silver and metallic, just how a blade should look, but there was something odd about it. It had an unnatural glint to it, a flash of evil and darkness hidden beneath the surface. Dean didn't know how something so small could contain so much malice and hate within it, but that was definitely the source of the magic. It was evil and it had been buried inside Sam, cursing him and eating him from inside. "Do we need to destroy it?" He pulled his lighter from his jeans but Bobby shook his head.

"I don't know if we can, but it shouldn't matter. Sam should be alright now that it's out of him, and I can lock it in a cursed object box when I get home." They both turned, as if in unison, to watch Sam. The blackness was still there, and Dean could see no change. Sam remained still, eyes closed, but as they both watched he convulsed once and then was still. The blackness spread once more, and Dean watched helplessly as it touched the spot directly above his heart.

Sam shot upright, his eyes flew open and he started to scream. The convulsions came once, then again. Sam shook like he was being thrown from side to side by some invisible force. Dean pressed his hands to his shoulders to try to calm his brother, but Sam shook him off with the most violent spasm yet.

"Sam, what's wrong?" Dean asked, but he knew that Sam couldn't hear him. "Bobby, what's happening to him?"

"I don't know. I don't understand!" Bobby told him, going to the other side of the hospital bed to try and hold Sam still.

"What do you mean, you don't know?" Dean shouted. He didn't realise that he was raising his voice. He didn't really care. "I thought you said he was going to be alright."

"He should be. We can't be too late. We had time!" Dean blanched. That didn't sound so good.

"What happens if we're too late?" Dean asked, dread building in his chest. He instinctively knew the answer but he needed Bobby to say it before he would believe it. For a long moment Bobby said nothing. He just looked straight at Dean, his solemnity speaking volumes. "What happens, Bobby? Tell me!"

"Sam doesn't make it."

"No!" Dean took a step away from the bed, and shook his head. Then, because that felt like a sensible thing to do, he continued to shake his head. It wasn't going to help, but it felt like he was doing something instead of just standing there. "It can't be. You said he would be fine."

Sam screamed out again, and Dean flinched. A hand shot out and grabbed Dean's arm, Sam's hand. Dean allowed Sam to pull him closer to the bed and Sam let go of his arm only to grab a handful of his t-shirt. "Dean!" he screamed. "Help me."

"Sam," Dean begged. "Stay with me. Fight this. You have to fight this."

"I can't. I can't." Sam was still screaming, teeth clenched and tears streaming down his cheeks from the pain. It was killing him, and Dean couldn't help. They were really losing him.

"Please, Sammy, you have to fight it." Dean was trying to keep it together, but he was fighting a losing battle. Both of them were. He could see from the sweat pooling on Sam's forehead that he was fighting the black magic with everything he had, but he was losing. He let out one more mangled scream and was flung back onto the pillows by the invisible force of the curse.

"Help me!" he whispered, his eyes locked with Dean's, and then he fell silent. His eyes rolled back into his head, and his body went limp. His fingers uncurled from around Dean's shirt and he was just gone.

"Sam?" Dean's voice was shaky, as if he couldn't comprehend what was happening. "Sam?" He spoke a little louder. Maybe Sam hadn't heard him. He just needed to be patient and Sam would hear him. "Sammy?" His voice cracked and he blinked as a single tear escaped the corner of his eye.

"He's gone, son," Bobby began, but Dean wouldn't listen to that. He wasn't gone. He was going to be fine; he had to be fine.

"Right Sam?" he asked, but he knew in his heart that he would get no reply. "Sam!" He screamed his brother's name to the heavens, pleading with Castiel or with anyone to hear him. The cry was so agonised and broken that Bobby stepped back from him in shock. Never had he heard Dean sound so utterly defeated, and for once he didn't know how to help him. All he could do was watch as Dean bent and pulled his brother into his arms, holding him tightly to him as the tears started to fall.

"Dean?" The voice came from the far side of the room and Bobby whirled around to see a familiar figure silhouetted against the dimming light from the window.

"You," Bobby exclaimed, but then Dean was on his feet and advancing towards the angel with hatred in his eyes.

"You show up now?" he seethed, and Castiel finally seemed to realise that this was perhaps not the entrance he had hoped for. He started to back away from Dean's advance, almost as if he were fearful of the distraught hunter. "I called for you yesterday. I begged for you to help me, and now you come? You are a bit too late to save the day!"

"I had no choice," the angel whispered, lifting pleading eyes to meet Dean's gaze, begging him to understand. "You have to believe me."

"No, I don't. Sam is gone!" Dean yelled, ready to hurt something, or someone. He knew he couldn't hurt Castiel if the angel didn't want him to, but he could have a pretty satisfying attempt before the angel was forced to smite him.

"He's not gone," Castiel said abruptly. "Look." He pointed over Dean's shoulder and, despite his anger, Dean couldn't help but look. What he saw made him pause in confusion. The blackness was receding from Sam's skin like a flood being sucked down a storm drain. It writhed and swirled as it moved, but it was disappearing much faster than it had spread. Within seconds the skin was clear and smooth again, and the return of colour was soon to follow.

Dean forgot all about Castiel and his anger as he rushed to Sam's side in time to see his brother's chest rise slowly, agonisingly slowly, and then fall. And then it rose once more, and Sam's eyes shot open.

"Dean?" he asked, and his brother dropped to his knees beside the bed. Sam's voice was croaky, and sore, but it was definitely Sam. Dean buried his head into the mattress of the bed and let it soak up the tears on his face, not quite trusting that his eyes weren't deceiving him. Then he looked up again, and saw Sam staring back at him. "What happened?" Sam asked.

"Oh, thank God!" Dean breathed, and Sam smiled. "I thought you were a goner for sure there, Sammy."

"Not that easy to kill me, Dean," Sam murmured as he turned to look at Bobby, who still had the blood-stained gloves on and the knife fragment in his palm. "Something tells me I missed a few things." He looked questioningly at Bobby, and then noticed Castiel backed in the corner. "Anyone care to explain?"

"We'll leave you two to talk," Bobby told Sam, and gestured for Castiel to follow him outside. After a brief glance at Dean, who narrowed his eyes in mistrust and anger, he joined Bobby at the door and the two left the room.

"Dean," Sam said, as soon as the door was shut. "I just want to say, I'm sorry. I should have told you."

"Sammy…" Dean hesitated and sighed, trying to decide what it was that he really needed to say to his brother. "I'm the one who should be sorry. I should have told you that a week ago, but I was being an asshole. Then today, I thought for a while there that I was never going to get to say it."

"Dean, its fine. I forgive you." Sam grinned at his big brother in the manipulative way that only little brothers can. "But you do know I'm going to hold you to that apology for months."

"Don't push your luck, Sam," Dean laughed, smiling for the first time in far too long. Sam missed his brother being happy, and wanted him to stay that way. He missed the care-free, fun-loving brother of his childhood, the man who thought bullets would bounce off him, and liked this new rapport they had going. "I'm still going to kick your ass for worrying me like that. You're all I've got left Sam, and if you die I'm gonna kill you."

"Deal," Sam agreed, and then looked towards the door. "Now, what's the deal with you and Castiel? I saw that look. What did you do this time?"

"Why do you assume it's my fault?" asked Dean petulantly, pouting like a little kid.

"Because I know you, Dean. Now go fix things with him already or I'll do it for you." Sam pretended like he would climb out of bed, but Dean made him stay put. He considered arguing, but agreed to appease his brother. He would do anything his brother asked of him right now. He owed him that much. Heading for the door he mentally prepared himself for his second apology of the day. He looked back as he reached it to see that Sam was asleep already, understandably exhausted from his ordeal.

"I'm really glad you're okay, Sammy. I don't know what I'd do without you."

_**I hope you liked it. If you did, don't forget to review and favourite. If you want to see more from me you can follow me as an author, and see all of my new uploads. I want to write more as the summer is coming and I finish college for the year soon. As always, requests and ideas are more than welcome. I will probably do most of them too, since it's more fun that way. Thanks.**_


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